Supporting international market demands and also persuading insurance companies they should provide pay outs should the door lock be exploited are other challenges..

At the moment the door lock / security situation most households face is dire and this is because insurance companies in the UK will only cover mortis and deadlock style locks, they basically say if someone can get in then not have to break out then you are uninsured.. A digital door lock always provides a single button exit (mostly for safety)..

Check out August.co, they are working on a BLE digital door lock, they are under the same VC as us but they don't seem very chatty, I don't know how they are getting on.. There are a few other BLE digital door locks and they aren't doing great, it's a really tough market because it's an incredibly old market.. Think about it, even Samsung haven't made a dent and their pockets are rediculously deep.. From what I can tell Samsung don't even really care about their digital door lock division, it's tiny...

Imho to launch an NFC door lock real world product would need ~1M funding and even then you aren't beginning to persuade people it's what they need.

Personally I can say it's for me the killer feature of the NFC Ring, the other stuff isn't anywhere near as practical.. Other people prefer using their ring to unlock their phone, it's each to their own but I use my ring on my door about 10 times a day and I love how simple it is and how I no longer have to worry about losing my keys..

So maybe an open source / community run digital door lock is a better solution, that way the development costs can be kept low.. It wont be as polished because it will have to use something like th ATMega328... You have to ask yourself though, do people really want to DIY their house door lock? It's a tough sell...

Me, I'll likely go the DIY route and as you mentioned use an atmega328. Purely because I love using atmegas in things though, the common reaction to me saying 'I will build my own door lock' tends to be first disbelief, then distaste, possibly at all the hassle involved. "But why do that when you can just go down to the hardware store and buy one."

If someone designed a relatively friendly version, cheap, that'd be a start.
Maybe they could then sort out some kind of bundle arrangement with the NFC ring team. The consumer loves the easy solution, couple that with a hefty dose of cool factor and a light sprinkling of 'oh hey we can use that on the phone too'.

If it happens sometime I'll support it and put my kludge away in the parts bin.

I will order parts first to build interface using Arduino and then create, if prototype looks promising a custom version with ATmega128. Will take some time, need to gather some money first, shouldn't be a big problem :) Problem is competition, I think johnny is right, this should be completely open source project so anyone could build it on it's own.

Those things would be nice, but easiest would just be NFC and leave an option to connect other things, arduino style controller would make this possible or perhaps use arduino compatible data lines. But the 'KISS' protocol is always the best one to follow in the first instance.

Me, I'll likely go the DIY route and as you mentioned use an atmega328. Purely because I love using atmegas in things though, the common reaction to me saying 'I will build my own door lock' tends to be first disbelief, then distaste, possibly at all the hassle involved. "But why do that when you can just go down to the hardware store and buy one."

The one I am designing uses electric strikes which are relatively cheap and allow you to keep the original hardware on the door (keys still work). I was planning on integrating with lockitron or something down the road to control the deadbolt. The reason for designing it like this is for something that doesn't require modification to your door or frame and still allows your original keys to work. The electric strikes won't fit in a wood doorframe without modification, but if you have a metal frame like my entryway, it should fit no problem. That is where I will be installing the first prototype.
I will upload a video of my breadboard solution shortly and edit this post.

That's excellent, strike plates are much easier to deal with in places where they require you to retain the fire rating for the door itself.
It's unfortunate that they tend to be so much bulkier than a standard plate, but it's the lesser of evils I reckon.

I have a strike lock on one of my inside doors, it performs relatively well but I dunno
a) What the power requirements are like compared to the conventional locks (not sure what they are called)? mortis maybe?
b) What insurance companies think about them.

What happens if power is removed from your system? Is the user still able to get out? I assume as there is some manual yale style handle on the inside that can be used?

You could almost fit a nano in the strike system btw, that'd be neat, then it's just an issue of providing power, my thought would be to use a smaller battery but use solar charging to keep it charged, not sure how feasible this is though!

Correct, the electric strike goes inside the doorframe itself. nothing about the existing door handle/locking mechanisms changes. When you use the electric strike you simply push the door open without having to turn the door knob/handle. The electric-strike itself is fail-secure meaning if it loses power it is not going to unlock. However, since you still have the original hardware in the door you can still unlock and open from the outside with a key or open the door from the inside with no problem.
I can't really speak for insurance companies.

Sticking a nano in there is an interesting idea. For my project, I want it somewhere I can get easy access in case I want to modify code or anything, also I plan on running multiple locks off one unit at some point, so a central location works better.
I had same idea for battery and solar, doubt one small enough to fit in the strike housing would be powerful enough. I still need to do testing. The strikes require 12v. Not sure how much current (is that the right word? I'm a programmer, not an EE) they draw.

I used to use Nanos in everything but I've taken a liking to the microduino, the form factor is tiny especially if you sacrifice the usb portion of the thing.
Strike plates shouldn't take too much current, it's just releasing a catch that holds the back of the strike in place, everything else is mechanical movement from when you push the door open.
Pics please John :-)

Yes, the door to my entryway only has the handle lock, so just the strike for that one. My main door has the lock on the handle and a deadbolt, so would need the lockitron and a strike for it.

So my entryway door has a metal frame. Those frames are set up perfectly for electric strikes. Wood frame doors however would require quite a bit of modification which is the case on my main door. Since I am renting, I will not be modifying that door frame :P
Electric strikes are pretty simple, and I feel like one could be designed to drop into a wooden doorframe without modification, unfortunately such a thing just does not exist.

I am somewhat considering designing lockitron type setup for the main door handle, I think the handle I have would be a good candidate for it. But that is wayyyyy down the road, I have too many other projects/hobbies that take precedence.

Keep in mind, this is a rental, so keeping all original hardware with no modification would be best route for me. However, my landlord is in IT and we are on decent enough terms that he probably wouldn't have a problem with me replacing the deadbolt and handle so long as the door itself isn't modified.
I would likely hook the arduino with ncf reader up to my network and have it control the lockitron over it's wifi connection.
If you have other ideas to keep the original hardware on the door, I would be more than open to them.

Aah, ok, I hadn't realised they use wifi (just checked the Lockitron site again). That's a bit more useful than a bluetooth only connection.
It's a difficult one, I rent too but it's a house so I'm pretty right with simply replacing the deadlatch while I'm living there.

The Kwikset with this "homeconnect" would probably be a good option. They come with zigbee/zwave, so theoretically I could integrate them and my nfc reader with the almond+ I backed on kickstarter.... if it ever ships :P

lol. I love KickStarter.
Yeah, that looks pretty cool. I had to look up kwikset, because Australian.
The almond+ looks very colourful and interesting.
Watch how many methods of entry you stack up, haha